FriendOfDeSoto

@FriendOfDeSoto@startrek.website

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨34% of the US population doesn't vote. Why do polticalitcians cling to the idea that these voters can't be reached?⁩ ⁨⁨23⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩:

  I don’t mind your suggestion. I think universal mail-ins are a good idea. At the same time, I have an inkling that you didn’t read my comment all the way to the end.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨34% of the US population doesn't vote. Why do polticalitcians cling to the idea that these voters can't be reached?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  I have sympathy for non-voters in the US. Not so much out of principle but because of how it is done. Voting takes place on a Tuesday. That’s because in ye olden days you had to allow people to attend church on Sunday before making the trip on horseback to participate in the election. That’s a cute tradition but clashes with the way the economy works today. People are very dependent on their low-wage jobs that they can be fired from easily. If you’re working two of those jobs to make ends meet, you may not have the “luxury” to skip work to go and vote on a normal weekday. That luxury often includes having to fill in a booklet of stuff that’s on the ballot. You’re not just voting on a president, a senator, or a congressperson. You may be asked your option on a plebiscite, a judge, a sheriff, a school board, etc. It is overinflated in my view and explains long slow moving lines at ballot stations that you don’t often see elsewhere. And that’s after a possibly Kafkaesque registration process to be eligible in the first place or to get mail-ins in some states. It is almost designed to keep people away. Maybe you’re taking these structural problems as something “politicians cling to.”

  Make election day a public holiday that forces businesses who are open anyway to allow all their employees to go and vote.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨34% of the US population doesn't vote. Why do polticalitcians cling to the idea that these voters can't be reached?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  I’m being put in a difficult situation here because I’m gonna have to go ahead and defend the American “snowflakes.” When it comes to interpreting the phrase “free elections” I think all democracies or close enough to that (which therefore includes the US) chose to say free means you’re also free not to participate. Except for the Aussies. And while I’m not an American snowflake, I’m still a snowflake because I agree with that interpretation. It wouldn’t just ruffle feathers in the US if mandatory election participation was prescribed. You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make it drink. Horse = voter, drink = vote. And I don’t think the Aussie governments of the last two decades have proven to be superior because they’re backed by a larger voter base. Remember the guy who ate raw onions?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩:

  I’m going to say yes and no to that one. At the time they establish forevermore what is left-wing and what is right-wing, we’re past the estates general being called and I think also past the tennis court oath. For me, that’s already revolutionary times, they just haven’t cut Louie’s head off yet.

  Before that, I don’t think there was much exchange between the second and the third estate. I am sure there were nobles who were willing to change things around. But it also wasn’t a case where the second and the third estate, and maybe even the king, could agree on something and that would’ve been the end of that. France was riddled by internal fiefdoms with their own dumb trumpian tariffs. Any relief for the third would have had to involve rationalizing the economy and there were powerful lobbies (like the farmer general) who wouldn’t like that. Plus, people were hungry and hungry people don’t think straight. And Louie would’ve preferred to stick his head in the sand anyway and other than maybe Necker none of his ministers satisfied the requirements of “forward looking.”

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  What you’re asking is a counter factual. There is no way to answer this question either way. The thing with revolutions is that people suspect it is coming at some point but are still surprised when it happens. The recent fall of Assad in Syria - we’d all forgotten about that mess. East Germany celebrated its 40th anniversary with socialist pomp and circumstance and crumbled a month or so later. The French Revolution was not just about abandoning feudalist structures. It ran in parallel with famine due to terrible weather, a looming bankruptcy of the crown, inefficient leadership from the king, a new way of leadership expected by his subjects, (invented) scandals that were spread by what would become mass media, and the changes in thinking in the age of enlightenment with people engaged in virtuous one-up-manship. That’s after France had lent a helping hand to the American Revolution, not so much out of commitment to the cause but to point the finger at the neighbors across the Channel. You needed all of this in the blender to get to a point where enough people were radicalized enough to start chopping heads off. So even if they had found a negotiated solution to address the class problem, the revolution might still have happened, maybe a bit different, maybe not at all. Nobody knows.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why are popes always really old?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Technically, they don’t have to be. They could elect a venerable whippersnapper cardinal - Dan Brown wrote a book about that. And that tells you how likely that is if he wrote the story. But it is possible.

  It would be rare because it takes seniority to get into the position. And politics to be well liked enough to be put forward and then elected. By mostly old people. Some of whom would like the job themselves.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Should naming your children stupid names be illegal?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  This is already location-dependent. I think Iceland has the most restrictive legislation with a prescribed list to choose from. Other countries have a layer of “is this really a name?” checking as part of the registration process after birth and parents can be sent back to square one.

  I think there is a balance to be had where you can’t get away with xc1>df or whatever but you could name your kid after a GoT character that tragically turned evil in the last season. My suggestion would be to include a second given name that is more established than Khalisi or Dumbledore, e.g. Kelly and David. If Khalisi Kelly’s last name is Knox obvs I wouldn’t insist on the alliteration. My point is then your child has a plan B when they get mocked for being called Hobbit in school. They can just go by Henry or whatever other boring name made the cut. That way you don’t need to get into a complicated legal situation where a minor would have to override the wish of their parents.

  After reaching adulthood legally, virtually anybody can try to change their name. Although the process may involve having to prove harm to get it approved in some places. I think there is a correlation between a laissez-faire attitude to naming and ease of getting a name change. In countries that are stricter to begin with, the hurdles are much higher and can be much costlier.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Maybe creating an ocean of AI disinformation so large it dilutes all verifiable truth is the key to getting people to unplugged.⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  I don’t think you need AI for that but it certainly helps. It’s good ol’ flooding the zone. The strategy is old. To me, it’s a lesson of the Soviet Union. If you continuously barrage people with a manicured version of the truth, one that includes Orwellian changes, you get them to unplug. It’s getting to be too much work to stay on top of important stuff. So people become pliable subjects for their leadership. One could argue that Putin is running Russia on this basis. Running for a party he’s not a member of. Cozying up to the left, then to the right, to the church, and back to the start. He’s everything and nothing to all sides. It’s a strategy that 47 wished he could run the US with.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨If trump shaved his head and didn't wear any makeup do you think you would recognize him?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  The problem with him is that he won’t shut up. You’d recognize that stream of consc… of something anywhere. Hypothetically, if consent was given you’d have to surgically remove his tongue as well.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why do Americanized names of places etc exist?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  First of all, all languages do this to an extent. Singling out America or English seems pointless to me.

  Geographical names are a nonsensical construct of traditions, conventions, and misunderstandings. Why shouldn’t a language come up with names that suit their tongue? Why shouldn’t they go with whatever becomes consensus in their language? Being correct is overall less important than being understood. And that’s being understood by your peers, not the people on the other end of the world.

  With place names it’s often old conflicts and historical differences that prevent adoption of modern place names. English is one of the few languages that made the change from Peking to Beijing, others didn’t want to be told “by the commies” what to call the city. People who were fighting Napoleon 200+ years ago still call Nice in France by its Italian name Nizza, the name of the city in circulation prior to the French takeover. Out of principle. Europe, where the spoken common language variety is greater than in North America, is more used to this and people just know Brussels can also be Brussel, Brüssel, or Bruxelles. It’s like the imperial system of measurements: it makes no effing sense but it works.

  If you argue respect you’re going to hit a massive wall with some languages. Mandarin Chinese is fresh in my mind that has very colorful names for all the places of the world that often have little or nothing in common with what the locals call it. Meiguo for America? Is that disrespectful? No, when you learn that this sort of means beautiful country. And it would take ages to get English speakers onto the same page calling China Zhongguo. And I’m quite sure the locals of Zhongguo would not understand the average American Joe saying it. So what would be gained by making that switch?

  Turkey wanted to change its English name because they don’t like the association with the eponymous bird. If the bird was commonly referred to as something else, and English wasn’t the lingua franca of the world, this would not have come up. Other languages have stuck with their version of Türkiye. And for the English speaking world I see an uphill battle for this to catch on. People only switched to Kyiv out of spite for Russian bombs. People are still going to say Turkey and not mean the bird. Same is true for recent gulf name changes.

  English is half filled with loanwords. Dejavu maybe just stands out to you. Parliament, pork, and necessary maybe not so much. I think all can be traced back via Norman French or later. All languages borrow words. Many of them change meaning and/or spelling after being borrowed. This is normal.

  All of the things you complained about seem perfectly alright to me. You’re looking for a fight with a windmill.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Are there any Trek episodes where they enforce the Prime Directive to protect a developing world within Federation space from an external influence?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I think these two are almost if not entirely exclusionary. It cannot be Federation space if the inhabitants are pre-warp.

  There are prime directive eff-ups. Like the flower bed trespasser assassins of S1 TNG. The Fed is in contact with the Edo although they shouldn’t be but somehow s happened. We don’t really know where they’re located in reference to everything else in the Fed or the universe. But even if everything around them was warp hopping mad, the system of the Edo or at least their planet Rubicun III should be an exclave. In the scenario where the Fed would have to defend them from a hypothetical anti-prime-direxxer it could be a protectorate but not Fed territory.

  I can think of two other instances with the PD that come close to this scenario but are no cigar. Data’s long-fingered pen pal Salenka or something like that and Worf’s adopted brother trying to save his knocked up pre-warp Penny Johnson. In both cases I don’t think we know if the territory was Fed, Fed adjacent, or something else. And it’s a moot point anyway because they were defending against natural disasters, not other species.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  They can charge for the room. Why not make that mandatory? Makes business sense.

  It’s also part of the tradition in North America. It may not be the military but learning to live with people, maybe people you really don’t like, is a life experience. And many people look back fondly at that, which they would not have chosen voluntarily.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Am I going crazy, or has people's spelling gotten awful lately?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  U be baader-meinhoffing this shit?

  People are dyslexic or not native speakers on here as well. English spelling is insane anyway. People fumble-eff around with giant sausage fingers on small screens. We collectively ruin our sight by constantly looking at screens from a foot away. Mistakes happen. I think I heard the first complaints about bad spelling on the collection of tubes in the late 90s. And we’re still here.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨How are the blatant anti-competitive practices of Apple just…allowed? How is this even possible?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  If Apple were the only player on the block, at least in Europe they would be under a lot more pressure. But they’re not. There are other OSs (although only one really matters), there are other phone makers.

  Antitrust is more reactive. There is a market, a dominant player, said player plays unfairly, the authorities react. That reaction takes years to go through all the levels of courts available. By the time we get a final ruling, the market has long moved on. The corporations know that too. As long as the lawyers are cheaper than the money they stand to lose they will carry on.

  And in Apple’s defense: the mobile operating system market is not that old. And it’s not clearly defined. And as long as there is wiggle room they can do whatever they want. Part of the problem is that the legislation dealing with antitrust on either side of the Atlantic is like copyright law: no longer fit for purpose.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨What would the USA look like if it had Referrendums/Initiatives on both the Federal and State level?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I think that very much depends on how they’re implemented. If there is some sort of electoral-college-equivalent in the process: very much more racist, isolationist, and misogynist. If it’s absolute numbers and no distorting process is applied: more racist and isolationist but abortion will be legalized by a narrow margin.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨i can’t tell if this is edginess or mental illness? i hope she’s doing okay⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  when i wasn’t there 24/7, she’d abuse substances, harm herself, and the like. she reported hearing voices, had sleeping issues as well.

  I think that answers your question. We all do real silly stuff in our teenage years but what you’re describing here goes beyond that.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨What are the odds of a person getting poisoned by food delivery driver? How would the odds change if the person is a public figure (such as Twitch Streamers)?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I don’t think the odds are calculable. But once you’ve reached a certain level of fame, some good historic knowledge of how to protect yourself from unwanted attention will surely kick in. You don’t want to get SWAT teamed, so I suppose you try to keep your address undoxxed. And I guess you could use an alias on your delivery app.

  I think you may also be overestimating the level of fame of streamers. They’ll be world famous within their bubble but two feet away from it nobody knows who they are. The odds are probably in their favor that the uber eats driver doesn’t know or care who they are.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why do European Leftist call their government's right wing despite having free healthcare?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  No healthcare is free. It is paid. Whether through taxes or mandatory insurance schemes. The money doesn’t grow on trees.

  It is a US BS narrative that ‘socialized healthcare’ is lefty silliness. And while there are conservatives in Europe who float the idea of abandoning government-organized healthcare every once in a while, every time they do they are met with a lot of frantic finger-pointing across the Atlantic. Everybody else sees a societal value in taking care of each other without any, or at least many, preconditions, like employment.

  Europe is not one homogenous political body. Much like the US on the state level isn’t. The only difference is that the US shares a party structure on both state and federal levels. But there are just two relevant parties, twice as many as in North Korea! The party spectrum has always been broader in European democracies. As a result, the European Parliament often creates strange bedfellows.

  There are marked differences between European countries and what they consider left and right. You’re looking at a lot of separate and shifting Overton windows. The suggested social cuts of the center-left Labour UK government would probably cause another revolution in France. The right-wingers of France are pro-Russia. The right-wingers of Poland absolutely aren’t. The list goes on.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Could you grind up a loaf of bread back into a flour and make a new loaf of bread?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  There is probably a law of diminishing returns in here because bread contains other ingredients as well (salt, yeast, etc.) and after a while the chemistry of baking will be out of whack.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Absolutely true!⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  This is something that is not universally true. You would not say something like that if you’ve ever traveled with small children.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Every case is different and the UK as a political union without a written constitution can technically allow one of their four home nations to become independent (again).

  The US has had bad experiences with seceding states. Big kerfuffle that people didn’t want to repeat.

  When it comes to international recognition of seceding territories, it’s frankly a mess. And also, frankly, everything is possible. Kosovo is an example where the majority of the international community decided to recognize it as a sovereign country. It was a solution to a war situation that didn’t make all parties happy. Serbia and Russia, for instance, still don’t recognize it. So while Mass may not technically be allowed to leave, if it did anyway, it would depend on the reaction from the rest of the union first and foremost, and then on the international community. If they back you and maybe even send peace keepers, there is a chance still. But there is a whole laundry list of things that have to go right for this to happen.

  I’d suggest you devote all your energy to fixing the United States first. Resist 47 and his GOP cult followers. Not all is lost just yet.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨What is it about humans when society rewards individuals with the power of millions they want to use it to fuck up society?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I think fucking up society is just an often unregulated byproduct of trying to amass more power and wealth.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Are most people here left-wing?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Trump’s tremendous social media platform truth dot barf runs on Activity Pub, they just don’t federate with anyone by default. It’s like they don’t want dissenting views on there. Weird.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨How does one snap their fingers?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I was a child and had enough time to devote to learning this.

  For me it’s my middle finger hitting the cushion below the thumb that makes the noise.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I don't have any kids or anything but want some one day. I grew up under the fog of 9/11. How do you go about explaining terrorism and evil to young kids without storybooking it?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  With kids there is no one size fits all approach. And you won’t do everything right as a parent either. Ever. You’re on a tightrope walk of keeping the ills of the world away from them and them fantasizing about the ills of the world from the bits and pieces they pick up along the way.

  They have to feel safe. With you/at home/etc. As long as you get that mostly right, the other pieces fall into place. One of those pieces will be the MO you’re looking for here.

  If you’re overly worried about the idea of having kids: even the dumbest, most ignorant humans have brought up the overwhelming majority of their children successfully. It’s not as hard as one thinks before. Because you worry about something like this way ahead of time, I am fairly sure you’ll do better than them.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨So this is it, is trump god? Will Republicans sacrifice their own well being to own the libs?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  It takes much longer to fall out of love than the other way around.

  The good news is that the magas cherry pick what lies they want to believe. And they’ll wholeheartedly believe when he says it wasn’t his dumb economic policy but [insert scapegoat here] that increased the price of eggs twentyfold.

  A gifted politician will find a way to give these people an out that doesn’t require them to admit they ran behind the wrong fasces, but somehow reinstalls stability in DC. If you can’t cut a path like that all they can do is double down because sure as hellfire they won’t admit he was, or indeed they were, the problem.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨These two should have had a spin off series⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  He sort of did. Beverly shot a hole into his belly.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨When did movie credits move from the beginning to the end?⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I think the tipping point where most credits were at the end occurred in the early 00s.

  I think it’s funny, nay, Alanis would call it ironic, that decades earlier trailers moved from the back to the front.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why is society so hard to work within whether online or physically in person⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Don’t shoot me, for I’m only a messenger As a rule in life, if you can blame everything on everyone around you it’s time to look inwards for change. I’m just saying, maybe it’s not all of us, maybe it’s you? My first reaction to reading your post was to suggest a therapist. And I’m saying that as somebody who isn’t great at social interactions either.

  We lionize medical professionals as these infallible gods in lab coats. They’re only human too, although they would not admit that. It’s good to keep that in mind; alter your perception to work with them on you rather than you being fully serviced by them.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨[deleted]⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  I don’t think that’s the case in France. Technically, there was consent from the parents. The age of consent is 15. What they did was morally questionable but not illegal.